As a counter-force to the, at times, monotonous and anonymous image of
the International Style, there was an interest in restoring the status
of old architectural styles and combining them with the new ideas to
create a more versatile visual form of easily distinguishable buildings
that also give the client company a symbolic, architectural identity.
In the 1990s, this Post-modernist style has been joined by the new,
Deconstructivist/neo-Modernist/etc. style of thinking, with the
historic references replaced by symbols of a "new machine age", so to
say.

was built in 1974-1977 as the visually novel corporate headquarters for
the Citicorp bank, the then-First National City Bank.

The project originated from an initiative by the Lutheran church of St.
Peter's (the "jazz church", where the memorial service for Louis
Armstrong was held), which was interested in selling its property on
the western portion of the block. First National, which had its
headquarters in the 399 Park Avenue on the
adjacent block right across Lexington Avenue and was in need of
expansion, set to acquire properties in 1968, including the church site,
which was purchased in 1970.

Five years later the needed individual sites were bagged for the
fantastic total sum of $40 million ($9 million for the church plot) and
the construction of the Citicorp Center began in 1974. (The only
building left intact on the block was the 880 Third Avenue from 1965,
at the south-eastern corner, due to its relatively young age.)

One of the seven initial designs featured two separate towers, one
housing the office space, the other an elevator and service tower.
Despite the availability of a thus completely free interior space, the
design was changed to the more traditional, integrated arrangement in
order to attract traditionally-inclined tenants and to cut down on the
structural expenses of the scheme.

The 59-storey tower rises to 279 m, and when completed, it raised
controversy because of its 50 m high sloping top
(image) --
originally designed to house 100 luxury condos, set back in a slope
configuration, although the execution of a residential plan was
eventually denied by the city officials as the zoning change fell
through. The top was then planned to be used to accommodate
experimental solar panels connected to air-conditioning equipment; the
ambitious installation was never installed (as another scheme of
energy-consciousness, the elevators are double-decked, serving both
even and odd-numbered floors simultaneously).

In addition to the mechanical and window-washing equipment, the tower
top houses a Tuned Mass Damper -- in effect, a 360 metric ton, 9
times 9-meter concrete block on an oiled plate moved by computers --
that lessens with its inertia the sway caused by strong winds to about
half. Strong winds are a constant enemy of high buildings, especially
those standing on stilts: there are four 10-storey pillars under the
middle of each facade (22 m from the corners) and a large center core
for elevators etc. The tower stands on its "feet" 40 m above the
street level.

The, obviously, novel structural system consists, along with the bold
support pillars, of diagonal braces on the outer walls -- which are
totally unnoticeable from the outside . These act both as structural
bracing and to transfer the loads to the four perimeter pillars. The
structural system underwent a hectic strengthening a year after the
building's completion due to a savings-conscious substitution of
originally-designed welding attachments to bolts. In the event of the
rare, but nevertheless not impossible hurricane-strength winds the
building could have otherwise toppled.

The buildings of the center (except for the church), as well as the
atrium interior, are clad in aluminium plating, including the bottom
of the tower. The tower itself has a uniform facade treatment of
alternating bands of alumium plating and window stripes, with the top
completely clad in alumium. The 165,430 m² building houses
93,000 m² of office space within.

The seven-storey, 21,000 m² shopping center, "The Market", is
located under the looming tower and has a 25 m high skylight-
illuminated central atrium with surrounding shops and restaurants.
One of the tower's support pillars rises from the patio of the atrium
space and through the roof, flanked by the set-back balcony levels of
the atrium's east wall.

The new St. Peter's Church (619 Lexington Avenue) is located on the
patio outside the Citicorp Center. The church is a polygonal design
clad in granite and decorated by sculptor Louis Nevelson, and still
continuing the tradition of regular free jazz concerts for public.

Next to the church, in the space vacated by the pillar-supported tower,
is a sunken plaza, one of the last before the
revised regulations. The regulations
were, in fact, the impetus behind the choice of the novel support
method for the tower, as well as the re-building of the church. See
Forum thread. The plaza connects to the
inside atrium and the church, as well as to the subway station.

After the 1998 merger with Travelers Group, the center was accordingly
named the Citigroup Center.

In April 2001, Boston Properties acquired the building for $735
million, as it did with the 399 Park Avenue a year later.

In the summer of 2002, as a result of an exponentially increased
possibility of a terrorist attack, the 53rd Street side pillar was
strengthened with blast shields of steel and copper as well as steel
bracing.

involved subsequently two architectural firms to bring the building to
its present appearance of early Post-modernist adaptation in 1979.

The original developer of the site -- located across the street from
Metropolitan Museum of Art at Fifth Avenue, and between two historic
buildings, a tall neo-Classical palazzo (by McKim, Mead & White,
1911) and a Beaux Arts apartment house (1903) -- managed to tear down
its occupants, two old town houses, before the firm went bankrupt.

Kalikow Co. then took over and hired Philip Birnbaum to design
an apartment tower to the site. Due to the planned building's existing
surroundings, public outcry resulted over the plans, and after lengthy
processing Johnson & Burgee were hired to especially re-design
the Fifth Avenue facade to suit the surroundings.

The base of the 23-storey building follows the rusticated austerity
of the neighbouring palazzo, with the upper facade split by a series
of glass-walled vertical shafts and protruding horizontal ornaments
"extending" from the building next door. The facade facing Fifth
Avenue is clad in limestone, while the other facades are of buff
brick.

After the Landmarks Preservation Committee rejected the original,
flat-top design, a tapering, fake mansard roof -- merely a wall facing
the street -- was added, getting its influence from the Beaux-Arts
neighbour.

The building incorporates 76 co-op apartments, many combined from
smaller units.

Built to a midblock site to the west of the notable Park Avenue
fixture, the Racquet and Tennis Club (McKim Mead & White, 1916),
a palazzo of Florentine Renaissance style, it rises over its
five-storey neighbour with unblocked views of the avenue and the
Seagram Building across.

In their bid to obtain air rights from the club, the developers were
originally unsuccessful, but when the city not only granted the
development 18,500 m² of extra space as a
public space bonus but also
a Park Avenue address -- in effect making the air (and address) rights
less crucial for the developers -- the club publicized what was most
probably a Trump-like scheme to turn the tables. Plans for a 38-storey
hotel on the club's site, partly above the club itself, and blocking
the Fishers' building's views, were announced in March 1978 (on the
same day that the chippendale (ex-)AT&T
Building, itself also using the galleria bonuses, was announced).
After that, and with the deadline for a public hearing on their
building approaching, the developers made a deal about purchasing the
air rights, undoubtedly one more profitable for the club.

The 45-storey building's lower portion, featuring an indoor atrium, is
visually restrained. Above that, the building follows the visual cues
of the Lever Building to the north, with
its green-tinted glass wall. The plan has no less than 15 corners,
in a sense a triangular prism with diagonals facing Park Avenue,
the sharp edges cut off and triangular vertical grooves carved into
these faces. The building rises unsetback to the top at 175 m.

Housing 98,900 m² in all, the floor sizes range from 2,740 to
4,090 m² per floor and can accommodate up to 12 corner offices
due to the shape of the plan. 25 elevators serve the building.

The glass-walled indoor public arcade extends through the block and
features artwork in the Chartwell Gallery, trees and a waterfall as
well as a Starbucks (no surprise there) and escalator leading to the
second floor mezzanine and office lobby. The double-height space has
inlaid granite floor paving and a ceiling with a thin grid pattern.
The monolithic elevator banks are clad in dark marble.

In a July 2002 deal, the insurance company Aon leased 25,000 m²
of space within the building, with the building also renamed Aon
Plaza.

was built in 1979-1982 by H.J. Kalikow & Co. as an office tower in the
Grand Central Terminal neighbourhood.

The building rises on a site once occupied by the Architects Building
(Ewing & Chappell and La Farge & Morris, 1912), built to
accommodate architects' offices and exhibition spaces.

Except for an elevated plaza facing Park Avenue and 40th Street, the
119,400 m² building abuts plot lines along its six-storey base.
The 49-storey tower has a
curious split-octagon plan, with the northern half of the form being
shifted towards Park Avenue. At the top at 191.5 m, two-storey notches
cut to tops of street-side facades split the form further. The whole
building is clad in a a curtain wall of dark-tinted glass and dark
aluminium.

The main entrance to the building is located at the diagonal part
facing the gray granite-clad plaza with a fountain. Furthermore, the
Park Avenue sidewalk between 40th and 41st Streets features 20 bronze
relief plaques
measuring 55 x 91 cm, depicting notable buildings in the vicinity.

The four-storey lobby has a large slanted glass skylight ceiling that is supported on the outside by four
oval-shaped granite columns. The gray granite paving extends to the
interiors and
the elevator bank walls. The 41st Street entrance at a lower level is
connected to the elevator bank via escalators. Lobbies include ground
floor retail spaces as well as the entrance to the Club 101
private/executive dining club and meeting space.

Office floors range from 2,160 to 4,230 m² in size and are
served by 25 elevators. The plan of the tower offers "only" eight corner
offices, not quite beating the Park Avenue
Plaza's 12... Two basement garage levels accommodate 100 cars.

The building features an energy-saving installation consisting of a
basement chiller plant supplying 1.9 million liters of ice slurry
(generated with off-peak hours electricity) that is designed to cool
the building down in daytime.

was built in 1980-1982 by Tishman Speyer Properties as an office tower
in Midtown Manhattan.

As the plot was being assembled, the owner of a single site on the 54th
Street side, housing the Reidy's restaurant, refused to sell the
property. As a result, the skyscraper was built around it, and the
restaurant now protrudes as a holdout
from the skyscraper mass. It took 24 months from the start of
construction to the full occupancy of the office spaces.

The 43-storey building has a facade of polished red granite and
brown-toned glass. The base of the building has a set-back on three
sides of lower floors that diagonally tapers from the plot lines,
before the shaft rises vertically to the top at 176 m. The top is
stepped in a series of terraces facing Madison Avenue.

The austere lobby has pink granite paving extending to the walls of the
elevator banks. The John Becker Gallery within features art exhibitions.
There is also retail space and two restaurants. The 96,100 m² of
rentable space within the building is served by 22 elevators and houses
also the headquarters of its developer, Tishman Speyer Properties.

The vest-pocket-sized plaza next to the recessed 53rd Street entrance is
enclosed in granite walls; the flanking wall opposite the entrance
incorporates a waterfall installation, with a freestanding 6-meter
section of the torn-down Berlin Wall on display, doubling as a graffiti
artwork. A sidewalk clock is located on the tree-lined Madison Avenue
side.

The austere style of the building follows the International Style with
hints to Classicism, with the curtain wall giving way to masonry
motifs.

The light grey granite exterior consists of two differing facade types,
facades on opposite sides being similar. The facade facing Park Avenue
(as well as the opposing side) has heavy columnwork base, main facade
being vertically accentuated by pilasters. The 42nd Street side has a tall
colonnade creating a sheltered bay, the facade having horizontal bands
of windows. There are openings at the top, with the street level
columns continuing through these.

On the ground floor, there is a public garden, a café and an annex
of the Whitney Museum of Modern Art housing temporary exhibitions.

was built in 1979-1983 as the namesake for its developer, Donald Trump,
to the site of the Bonwit Teller department store.

Built next to the venerable jewellery store of Tiffany & Co., the
building used the air rights of
its older neighbour, as well as utilized the bonuses offered by the
Fifth Avenue Special District
zoning. (Trump even originally contemplated naming the building Tiffany
Tower.)

The co-operation between Scutt and Trump, the developer behind several
NYC projects, was a result of Trump's impression in the style that
Scutt had shown with the "crowned" design of the
1 Astor Plaza, making it distinguishable
from the glass-box designs of that day.

The building was the tallest concrete-framed tower in the city at the
time of its completion. The 68-storey tower has a facade of
dark-tinted glass, rising to the height of 202.5 m over Fifth Avenue.
The corner of facade facing the intersection of Fifth Avenue and 56th
Street is sliced off in a series of setbacks (forming a sort of hanging
garden and place for festive displays), with the corner above that broken
diagonally into a series of sawtooth edges running to the top.

The bottom six floors of the building consist of shops and restaurants
surrounding an atrium, decorated with glowing rosy-pink marble and shiny
brass, the whole crowned with a five-storey waterfall and a skylight.

The next twenty storeys are for offices (Trump's own office is on the
26th floor), and the top forty storeys are occupied by a total of 266
luxury apartments, all with views on three side -- and many of them
housing multimillionaires. The entrance to the apartments is from 56th
Street, whereas the office elevators are located in the main lobby.

Trump himself has a modest (characteristically) fifty-three-room
penthouse apartment with a surrounding rooftop garden on the top.
(The apartment was used as a filming location in the
film The Devil's Advocate (1997), representing the home
of a triple-homicide suspect real-estate developer (!).)

The company had, in fact, already had activity at the same address,
such as housing a showroom for its "business machines", designed by
Eliot Noyes in 1955.

The 184 m tall building, in the shape of a five-cornered prism, has its
diagonal facade facing south-west. The 41-storey exterior is clad in
polished red granite, alternating with continuous stripes of
blue-green-tinted windows.

The entrance to the lobby is through the north-east corner that has
been sliced off diagonally as a cantilevered structure, with the corner
of the building looming overhead. The slice-off cost approximately $10
million to realize structurally. The granite paving on the outside
extends into the lobby itself. Michael Heizer's sculpture Levitated
Mass (1982), an engraved flat stone laying inside an angled pool
of stainless steel, stands in front of the entrance.

The building incorporates the Garden Plaza, a part of a through-block
arcade connecting 56th and 57th Streets and the IBM with the
neighbouring Trump Tower. The spacious, 930
m² greenhouse-like glass atrium has a zig-zag roof of alternating
diagonal and vertical panes, and it houses full-sized bamboo trees
within, although many of the original number of eleven have been
removed to accommodate contemporary art installations by the Pace
Wildenstein Gallery.

The building also originally had the IBM Gallery of Arts & Sciences, a
museum and art performance and exhibition room next to the lobby, but
the gallery was later closed. The space has been occupied by Freedom
Forum's media museum Newseum.

Although IBM sold the building to the developer Edward J. Minskoff and
Teachers Retirement System of Ohio in 1994, it has retained a sizable
portion of the building in its use. In Feb. 2003, the company renewed
the tenantship deal to continue after 2004 -- the company will remain
on eight floors of the building.

was completed in 1984 for its original owner, the AT&T
telecommunications company.

Work on the building started in 1978, and from the beginning this
38-storey building created heated debate both for and against. The city
agreed to allow the vertical massing of the building as a zoning
remission against the public amenities in the form of open-air gallery
spaces, as well as AT&T's promise to retain its activities in the
building well into the future.

To make this 197.5 m tall building look more monumental, Johnson topped
it with the unique, curving post-modernist "chippendale" forms. Like
his work on the Seagram Building for
International Style, also this building was a model for a new style for
others to follow.

The building is clad in grayish-pink granite from the same quarry that
supplied the facade facing for Grand Central Terminal.

Structurally, the building employs tube
frame in its framework, with the tubular columns tied with trusses
at the top and bottom.

In accordance with Madison Avenue's identity as a shopping street, the
actual building was lifted 20 m up from the street level, with only the
minimalist central lobby, identified outside by the 24 m high arched
bay, being actual building. From this vaulted, neo-Romanesque entrance
lobby elevators take customers to the building's white marble main
lobby above with 25 more elevators for reaching the upper floors. The
elevators have bronze doors and their artwork was inspired by the
Chrysler Building elevators.

At the street level, there were open galleries created under the
building by the tall colonnades around the base and, behind the building, a 20 m high through-block galleria with a curving skylight. All these
spaces have zig-zag-patterned granite mosaic floor.

Despite the abovementioned promises to the contrary, a large portion of
AT&T headquarters had already been relocated to New Jersey even before
the building's completion, and in 1992 the Sony Corporation bought the
building as AT&T moved its activities in Manhattan to the
Sixth Avenue premises in TriBeCa.

In a remodelling by Gwathmey Siegel, the open galleries
were subsequently enclosed as Sony retail spaces and the skylighted
galleria -- originally presented for approval and zoning remission as
an open-air throughway -- was enclosed and partly used up as a retail
space with cafés as the Sony Plaza. Sony Wonder Technology Lab,
a multimedia showcase for new products and technologies, is also
reachable from the plaza.

In the course of the rebuilding, 980 m² (out of 1,310 m² total)
of open arcade space was replaced by 560 m² of retail space and the
covered arcade increased by 380 m² and enclosed. The "transaction"
was approved on the basis of differing
bonus ratios for public amenities.

A statue from the roof of the previous AT&T headquarters at 195
Broadway, the seven-meter Spirit of Communication (or "Golden
Boy") by Evelyn B. Longman, was removed from the entrance lobby after
the transaction and moved to AT&T's New Jersey premises.

Originally, the plot was assembled to house the new headquarters for
the rival Lehman Brothers, but the depression of the mid-1970s forced
a cancellation. Located on a trapezoid plot next to the Fraunces Tavern
Historic Block in Downtown Manhattan, the 29-storey building utilizes its
air rights to gain a bulk of over 90,000 m². Similarly, the brown
stone facade treatment was a nod towards the landmark block.

With chamfered corners to the south, the building wall facing Stone
Street (or its location, before its portion got de-mapped) to the north
follows its curvature, with the lobby curving similarly. A result of
the change to the street-plan was the granting of a landmark status to
all the nearby street "grid".

Entrance to the building is through an archway and underneath a
bronze plaque with the map of Lower manhattan as it was in c. 1660. During
the excavations objects from the Dutch era were found and recovered before
the construction work was started.

was built in 1983 by The Rockefeller Group for the Continental Insurance
Company.

Located along the East River waterfront in Downtown Manhattan, the
101,500 m² bulk of the $115 million tower was enabled by the
transfer of air-rights from low-rises in the South Street Seaport Museum
area.

The 41-storey building has an octagonal plan that is broken at the lower
level by skirt-like extensions that expand from the main mass. The
facades of the building are of dark-tinted glass throughout, a
notable contrast with the neighbouring high-rises. The mechanical floors
in the chamfered rooftop structure reach 169 m.

Entrance to the paved and landscaped interior arcade below the
building's footprint is underneath the space-frame-supported skylight
that rises diagonally from the corners of the extensions, in principal
akin to the 101 Park Avenue lobby. The outer
glass walls consist of similar lattice-work. The arcade interior
surfaces, as well as the office building's columns extending through the
space have a facing of warm-toned wood
(link).

Among the amenities are the Center for Arts Education's The Gallery at
180 Maiden Lane, an artistic showcase for public school students, an
auditorium and lecture halls.

The building was sold to The Moinian Group for $355 million in August 2004.

was built in 1982-1983 to the Downtown East River waterfront for the
National Westminster Bank.

The 31-storey building consists of three intertwined masses; the core,
consisting of twin cylinders joined by straight walls, is clad in
a reflective glass curtain wall and reaches the height of 123 m. Flanking
it, and two floors lower, are two offset rectangular masses with facades
of horizontal bands of glass and pink granite cladding, leaving
only the northeastern and southwestern cylinder corners of the core
exposed.

The building features 55,000 m² of office space, with main entrance
through the corner, underneath a curved canopy.

During the excavation work, an 18th Century British merchant ship, used to
hold the old landfill in place, was discovered. After archeological
studies, the bow portion was detached and moved to Newport News, Va. for
restoration and display.

was completed in 1984 as an office building next to the South Street Seaport
District.

The 34-storey building is clad in gray granite and rises as an unsetback
slab to 133 m. The mid-portion of the west facade is recessed, whereas the
east facade facing the Seaport has the mid-portion protruding out of recesses
between the three sections.

The main entrance is from John Street under a three-bay portal of glass.
The lobby has a uniform, light-toned finish
throughout and has on three walls large-scale artwork of colourful
geometrical patterns.

There is 97,100 m² of space within the building, with floors ranging
from 3,250 m² to 1,450 m² at the top floor including only the
center portion of the slab. There are 20 elevators and a basement garage.
The building also houses the Downtown TKTS office.

In October 2005, the NYC Office of the Comptroller leased 12,000 m² of
space within the building, moving from 1 Centre Street.

Originally started as a development of Cadillac-Fairview, the building
was acquired by Jaymont Properties as it was completed.

The exterior of the 173.5 m tall building forms a distinctive
pattern of panels of polished red Balmoral granite from Finland
alternating with window openings, clearly indicating the location of the
outer wall diagonal bracing.

The concrete structural frame uses the off-center core (on the western
side) and the outer wall colonnade, with its large-scale wind bracing,
to form the 50 column-free floors with a total of 43,600 m² of
rentable space. On the longer, avenue-facing sides the
bracing forms a series of X's, while on the shorter sides the bracing
zigzags through the facades. The structure won the Concrete Industry
Board Annual Award in 1983. Each floor also has its own independent
HVAC system.

On the Third Avenue front, the plaza is paved in red brick and granite,
with a row of tress flanking the roadway.

The building incorporates, among other business-related facilities, a
154-seat auditorium as part of the largest office building conference
center in Midtown Manhattan.

was built in 1984 as the most radical extension to date to the
Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), started on the present
site in 1939 by Philip Goodwin and Edward Durrell Stone,
and later extended by Philip Johnson.

First proposed and outlined in 1976, the slender 52-storey glass tower
was built to help pay for the extension and renovation of the museum --
presently the lower floors of the tower house museum exhibition spaces,
expanding museum's floor area considerably.

This 198 m tall residential tower was constructed with 263 apartments
and cost $55 million to build. The glass facade consists of variously
tinted blue-green opaque glass and has a series of recessed terraces at
the top.

At the moment there are plans for further expansion of the museum
premises, also affecting the tower. Plans by the Japanese architect
Yoshio Taniguchi include the extension to adjacent plots, removal of the glass atrium, as well as altering the south facade of
the tower. The expansion is planned to be complete by 2004.

was built in 1984 by R. H. Sanbar as a residential high-rise next
to the 1 Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, completed a
decade earlier.

The 43-storey tower with brown brick cladding rises to 137 m and has a
roughly L-shaped plan accented by the faceted protrusions of corner
balconies, made of prefabricated brick elements. Along with living
room strip windows, the balconies form horizontal striping around the
diagonal portion facing the street corner at Second Avenue and 47th
Street. The entrance is located next to this chamfered corner.

There are 133 luxury apartments and such amenities as a health club with
swimming pool and a garage. The building lobby features the Gallery at Dag
Hammarskjold Tower for contemporary art exhibitions.

The actual Dag Hammarskjold Plaza
(link) to the
east occupies a whole blockfront
facing 47th Street between First and Second Avenues. It features, for
example, the Holocaust Memorial Wall and a greenery named Katharine
Hepburn Garden in 1997.

was built in 1985-1986 to Seventh Avenue as the western tower on the
block owned by the Equitable Life Assurance Society.

The facade of this 54-storey building consists of alternating bands
of windows and limestone, interrupted by piers of brown granite.
The tower rises to the height of 228.5 m through two setbacks,
indicated by recessed bays on the north and south facades. The
plain limestone top with its vertical granite striping forms the
last setback and features an arched Romanesque window on both ends
-- this houses the Equitable boardroom.

Included within the 142,660 m² state-of-art building is a
100-seat auditorium, a fitness club and several restaurants as an
effort to attract tenants to this then professionally unfashionable
part of Midtown. Similarly, the building was connected to the
extensive Rockfeller Center underground concourse, and a renovation
was undertaken in the eastern Equitable building on the Sixth Avenue
side.

On the ground floor there is a through-block galleria as well as the
Equitable (now AXA) Gallery for art exhibitions.

In 1986 Roy Liechtenstein enhanced the vast, skylighted entrance
atrium with his large (22.3 x 10.8 m) Mural with Blue
Brushstroke. Primarily a collage of his earlier works, the mural
was sketched on the wall with the aid of slide projectors, and then
painted.

was completed in 1985 for the Marriott hotel chain on Times Square, on a
site occupied by five theater buildings.

Announced already in 1972, this hotel project was to restore some of the
all-public nature of the old Times Square. Portman, an
architect-developer, acted as a codeveloper also in this project,
collecting no less than 90 percent of the financial backing.

Portman's first plan was in the form of two parallel slabs, connected
only by five-storey bridges. By the time of the final plan he had
incorporated his hotel architecture trademark into the design: an
interior atrium, around which the rooms were grouped.

Originally to be completed in 1977, the hotel was realized only eight
years later, after the financial and planning climate was favourable.
As even the Special Theater District Zoning
Amendment, introduced with the neighbouring
1 Astor Plaza, could not give enough bulk
for the 50-storey building, a zoning remapping was granted, adding a 20
per cent overhead bonus, as well as height and setback variation and a
permit for a 400-car public carage.

The struggle for the preservation of old theater buildings, however,
led to the creation of the Theater
District zoning area and renovation of the Forty-second Street
Theater building by the developers as a "payment" for the zoning
variances of the new hotel.

The entrance to the hotel is via the "caragelike" drivethrough and an
austere street-level elevator lobby, with the main hotel lobby
reachable by elevator, so the hotel isn't one of the most prominent
outwardly -- except for the neon-signs (it's Times Square, after all)
and the lit arches above the street entrances.

Indeed, in addition to the neon advertising signs, the hotel's less
prominent appearance was a direct result of its location in Times
Square. The less savoury neighbourhood of the 1970s and 1980s led to a
design that provided ample blank walls and a guarded entrance from
side-streets.

The hotel building incorporates, in fact, two atria: a smaller one
within the base, around which the shops, restaurants and exhibition and
meeting rooms (54, with 9,300 m² of total space), as well as the
400-seat cinema are grouped, and the 35-storey main atrium
(image), rising from the 13th story lobby. A circular
shaft with tracks on the outside for glass-walled elevators occupies
the center of the atria and rises from the street level to the
revolving lounge bar at the top. The base also houses a revolving
lounge, with views to the street and lower atrium.

Hotel's musical theater is located to the Broadway side of the base,
above the driveway, and has a capacity of 1,050. Also the theater is
accessible from the hotel's street-level lobby by elevators of the
elevator shaft.

The upper atrium has starlit trees and a large, rotating clock around
its midfloor café. The 1,946 hotel rooms and 56 suites are
located both in the north and south slabs as well as the connecting
"bridges", supported by 34 m long trusses and set to different distances
from the elevator shaft. The rooms are entered from the inside
balconies and have views to both outside and to the atrium.

was built in 1984-1985 as an addition to the
World Trade Center, located across
Vesey Street from the main compound.

Although a part of the WTC in name, the Silverstein
Properties-developed building, also known as the Tishman Center
after its constructors, was on a separate ground lease and tax lot
from the rest of the Center (see
map). The building was
built atop the power substation building that supplied much of
Downtown Manhattan with electricity. To make matters worse, the
foundations had to be built through the building avoiding not only
the operational equipment there, but also the ramp serving the
WTC and a subway line. Moreover, the WTC towers caused wind
conditions that required special stiffening determined by
computer-run wind analysis.

The resulting frame was divided into two distinct zones, with the
first seven floors built around a stiffened central core that
was connected through braced floor slabs to a wind truss system on
the lower east and west walls. From seventh to the top, the braced
outer wall was augmented by two two-storey "belts" against high wind
forces. On the north side, the outer wall above the seventh floor up
cantilevered two meters over the substation building, which required
the installation of 20 m long tapering girders to be installed from
the core to the outer wall.

As the existing foundations through the substation building were
mostly not aligned with the perimeter colonnade of the new tower,
they had to be fitted with concrete caps to allow transfer of loads
to the foundations. For the core, the loads were transferred through
a heavily braced foundation slab. 50 new foundation "caissons" were
built, most of which had to be squeezed through the substation
building.

Although not small by any standards -- built on Port Authority land,
it was exempt from zoning regulations and could occupy the whole
trapezoidal plot with no setbacks -- the building's 44 4,450 m²
floors and height of 160 m were obviously dwarfed by its older twin
brothers. The building's appearance and its alternating facing
(horizontal glass striping on the Barclay and Vesey Street sides and
red granite, holed by smaller windows, on the other two) set it apart
also visually from the Twin Towers of the late 1960s.

The building was from the onset equipped with its own power substation
for reselling of electricity to the tenants. After the 1993 terrorist
attack in the World Trade Center, the mayoral emergency command center
was built within the building, with its own power generators for
emergency electricity generation.

In front of the building, on the WTC compound plaza level, stood
Alexander Calder's 8-meter steel sculpture
Three Red Wings as well as pedestrian bridges over Vesey Street
from the WTC compound, with a round plexiglass tube covering
(image) the eastern one.

The occupation of the building went through the same difficulties as
its larger twin brethren. The investment bank Drexel Burnham Lambert
(best known for its star dealer, the notorious "junk bond king"
Michael Milken) was to become a tenant in 1986 but backed out in favour
of the eventually ill-fated Boston Properties' go at the
Columbus Circle; in 1988 Salomon Brothers
finally relieved Silverstein with their lease of half of the ofice
space.

The building collapsed during the terrorist attack on the WTC in
September 2001, having been structurally weakened by the destruction
of the nearby WTC towers. A theory strongly suggests that the large
amount of diesel fuel for the emergency generators stored within
the building (for the use of, for example, the Mayor's emergency
center) could have created the heat that led to the collapse.
Especially as none of the other skyscrapers surrounding the WTC were
structurally fatally damaged.

was completed in 1986 by Albanese Development as a residential tower to the
north-west from the United Nations.

The 52-storey building sports an all-black facing not unlike in appearance
to the Trump World Tower next door.
In fact, too much next door for the liking of many of the 100 U.N. Plaza
residents, as the super-tall neighbour blocks the view to the U.N.
complex.

The brick-clad shaft of the tower slab is set-back from the street and
rises vertically with balconies on the corners and mid-portions of the
north and south facades, until the eight top apartment floors, where its
east and west facades taper shaply to form a top wedge. The balconies of
these apartments protrude as horizontal "ribs" and extend around the
corners of the slopes. The top triangle at 170 m houses the mechanical
floors and heat exchangers.

The triangular theme of the top extends to the ground floor lobby with its
triangular window arches -- being gold-trimmed inside the lobby and
complemented with gold striping on the walls -- and pitched-roof entrance
canopy, also gold-tinted, on the plaza side. There are 267 apartments in
the building.

The landscaped plaza by Thomas Balsley Assocs. is located on the
east side of the building, extending to First Avenue. In addition to
fountains and greenery, the multilevel plaza consists of extensive
brickwork extending to the sidewalks along both the plaza and the building.

The building is located next to the Citicorp
Center, with an equally "angled" appearance and an aluminium facade
with horizontal stripes of windows. All the window stripes have the
upper half consisting of light blue "shades" above the open window
panel.

The main shaft of the 47-storey building is rectangular, with a
triangular portion on the Lexington Avenue side pointing to the street,
the top of the building at 199 m is in the shape of a triangular prism
pointing to the opposite direction.

Cantilevered under the diagonally sliced-off corner on the Citicorp
side -- providing an open view along Lexington Avenue to the Center --
and set behind a single round column is the entrance to the lobby,
with all-glass walls facing building's triangular plaza. The
lobby has banded white marble decor in the vein of Italian Renaissance
as well as artwork Salto Nel Mio Sacco (1985) by Frank Stella.

The paved plaza has, similarly to Citicorp Center's, an entrance to a
subway station, in this case a stairway covered with a slanted glass
canopy consisting of large panes.

or the City Center Tower, was completed in 1989 as a 72-storey office
and apartment building, the city's tallest mixed-use skyscraper.

The 77,100 m² building uses the air rights of the adjacent City
Center for the Performing Arts (arch. Harry P. Knowles and
Clinton & Russell, 1924). This glass tower of a primarily
octagonal plan has streamlined extension wings that set back along
with the gradual decrease of the central octagon's diameter. The
octagon has a vertically accentuated glass facade, while the wings
feature horizontal strips of glass and marble. The tower ends in a
domed top at the height of 248 m (the dome being a nod towards the
City Center building).

As a residential tower, the building uses a concrete structural
system, being at the time of its completion the second tallest
concrete-framed skyscraper in the world.

The two lobbies (for the residential and office sections of the
building) are lavishly decorated with marble and wood. The bottom 23
floors of the tower are for commercial use and above it there are 353
luxury apartments, growing in size the higher they are. At the top
there are two 200 m² apartments. There is also a health club for
the tower residents.

continued in 1986 the Johnson/Burgee adaptations of historic
styles in New York City high-rises.

The building site was originally planned for the use of the next-door
neighbour Federal Reserve Bank's extension, but this privately
developed office building eventually occupied the plot -- albeit also
the bank eventually leased space from the building.

The building draws its inspiration from medieval castle design, with
the multiple round towers which extend to the ground, as well as the
holed balustrade at the building top, impersonating a battlement.

The regular row of windows running through the whole building brings
the design inevitably to the late 20th century, with the resulting air
of lightness and transparency.

As well as the circular pillars, also a set of narrower columns
in-between define the building on the street level. They support a
high arcade, behind which is the glass-walled lobby.

completed in 1986, this building followed the
ex-AT&T Building and continued Johnson's
process of providing NYC skyscrapers with a new and more unconventional
form and style.

The 143 m tall building consists of four oval-shaped cylinders placed
above each other, each smaller in diameter than the one below, creating
the building a set-back appearance. On the 36-storey facade, red
granite spandrels alternate with the shiny steel of horizontal window
bands.

The elliptical lobby has a colonnade of steel-banded and "hat-topped"
round pillars along the glassed outer wall line, and the columns double
on the outside, forming a narrow arcade there.

Due to the placement of the elevators to the side away from Lexington
Avenue, the "cylinders" are offset to the mid-block. One result of the
unusual form of the building was the required installation of
customized HVAC and ventilation fixtures, with the appropriate cost
effects.

was completed in 1986 for the Brodsky Organization as an Upper West Side
residential high-rise.

The brick-clad, 52-storey slab faces east and west, straddling its
mid-block site between 59th and 60th Streets. The set-back top at 157.5 m
creates double terraces facing south.

The building incorporates 498 rental apartments as well as a health club
and 9,300 m² of medical offices for the nearby Roosevelt Hospital,
with a separate entrance with ziggurat themes from 59th Street. The
carage has space for 125 cars.

was built in 1984-1987 to South Street in Financial District as an office
building.

The site was originally owned by the Federal Government and contained the
U.S. Assay Building (arch. James A. Wetmore, 1930). As the New York
Assay Office, which had operated since 1853, was closed down in 1982, the
plot was sold for $27 million.

The new development utilized the air rights from a demolished fire
station (which is now located within the building, on the South Street
side) and the neo-Renaissance 100 Old Slip, a former police station and
the home of the NY Police Museum next door to the south.

The base of the building features a rectangular-in-plan, neo-Classical
granite colonnade enclosing a 12 m high outside arcade with rectangular
clerestory openings at the top. The base material and texture is a nod
towards the landmarked Police Museum building.

Above the gray granite-clad base, the 37-storey building forms a tower
plan of granite-clad, strip-windowed rectangle with corners of
chamfered, dark-tinted glass curtain wall. This basic form then
gradually transforms in a series of jagged steps and set-backs to a
fully glass-walled octagon reaching 175.5 m.

Entrance to the building is from three of the corners (the fourth is for
basement parking entrance), underneath the
diagonal curtain wall portions, but set-back from the wall line so that
the building corner columns extend through the atrium space. The colonnades
and openings are echoed in the
lobby outer walls, albeit naturally glazed. The lobby is of the same
height as the atrium and has brown marble decor, floor paving in light
tone and elevator bank walls in darker tones.

In plan, the office floors feature 16 corners in every configuration to
the last granite-clad set-back. In all, the building incorporates
101,300 m² of office space, including a trading floor. 26
elevators serve the floors.

There is a public plaza along Gouverneur Lane, clad in the same red
paving stones as the arcade and sidewalks.

was completed in 1988 by Madison Equities as an office building along
Lexington Avenue.

The building consists of two masses as a generally L-shaped entity.
Facing the plaza at the corner of Lexington Avenue and 57th Street, the
32-storey curving facade of the tower rises all the way to the top at
131 m. The corners of its top portion are chamfered, starting from the
roof level of the adjoining lower wing to the west, in turn topped by an
arched feature, housing what might be a solar panel installation. Both
masses are set back from the base which has horizontally accentuated
stone facing on the first two floors. The
neo-Classical facades are clad in gray granite and feature unbroken
vertical window stripes.

The building incorporates 42,900 m² of office and retail space.
As the building was constructed from the beginning as an antiques center,
the retail space design caters to these special needs; the walls and
floors were specially protected against any dampness that might be
seeping through and double doors are used to minimize humidity from the
outside.

In 1997, Cohen Brothers obtained the building for $113 million and made a
renovation that was completed in September 2001.

The plaza in front of the curving main facade is elevated from the
street level and features a round granite "temple" flanked with fountains
as its sculptural piece (image).

The Cohen Park, named after the owners, is a vest-pocket plaza next to the entrance to the Galleria next door. The
park is enclosed within a two-floor-high extension of the street facade
and features a 4.5-meter illuminated waterfall and landscaping by
Thomas Balsley as well as sculptures by Franco Scuderi.

was completed in 1988 by Macklowe Properties as an office-residential
tower.

Originally, there had been plans for a joint high-rise development
combining also the plot of the Carnegie Hall
Tower. The plan came to nothing as the owner of the Russian Tea
Room, which is located between the plots and extends through the block,
refused to sell her property.
Eventually both towers were built independently on their separate
plots, only the 6-meter width of the restaurant's site separating them
in the skies.

Clad in a dark glass curtain wall and rising from a rectangular base
in scale with the surrounding buildings on 57th Street, the 68-storey
tower differs strikingly in appearance from its rectangular,
contextual colour brick neighbour. The tower has a triangular plan
with the diagonal side facing north-east, towards Central Park. With
only a notch at the top of the north edge and the jagged south edge
breaking the prism form, the tower rises to the height of 218 m.

The building houses offices in the lower floors with 234 apartments
on 49 floors occupying the upper portion of the tower. The residential
portion features a private restaurant with outdoor terrace as well as
a health club with a swimming pool.

The 56th street wall is set back from the plot line, forming a plaza
with large brick planters.
The lobby extends through the block; the ground floor has 280
m² of retail space and there is a basement garage.

L&L Acquisitions and Principal Life Insurance Co. bought the 22,800
m² office portion of the building for $120 million in June 2005.

of 1988 occupies the curved plot at the intersection of State Street
and Water Street.

The building replaced the cross-topped Seamen's Church Institute
hostel only 16 years after its completion.

The plan of the building is in the shape of a quarter of a circle and
the most striking portion of the facade, the curving wall of bluish
glass, faces south, distinguishably different from the 1970s buildings
that have so far dominated the immediate surroundings of the South
Ferry.

The structural system of the building is visible at the ground floor
level, where the perimeter columns support the uplifted facade, and
the diagonally-braced center core and elevator shafts are visible
behind glass curtain. (image).

A floor up, the building's main lobby has walls of glass as well as
cobblestone paving.

Nesting beside the skyscrapers, the historic, colonnaded building at
7-8 Broad Street is the only remaining 18th Century private house in
Downtown Manhattan.

The 56-storey building "duels" about the dominance of Columbus Circle
airspace with the ex-Gulf and Western
Building, facing it across the traffic circle. Until the completion
of the planned New Coliseum project
to replace the neighbouring New York Coliseum west of the Circle, these
towers will continue to dominate the immediate surroundings.

The alumium-clad building is characterized by numerous setbacks and
angled protrusions -- which offer views to three directions -- the rise
ending to an octagonal water tank housing at 191.5 m. The building has
a total of 160 apartments, as well as a health club and a roof-top
sundeck.